We’d seen an awful lot of wild proboscis monkeys thus far in Borneo - as they were almost a daily fixture at nature lodge cruises. But we’d not had enough of them, so took a short bus ride to a sanctuary dedicated to their protection: the sandakan proboscis monkey sanctuary.
Once there we were lead up some walkways to a tree lined clearing. That’s where we found them - relaxing in the trees; on logs and so on; even on the walkway as we passed.
We wandered around for a while, taking pics and saying “wow” a lot.
After a while we came across the alpha male of the group (we could tell he was the alpha as he had the biggest nose of all). He was sat on a handrail of our walkway a short distance ahead.
I got my phone out for a quick snap. As I did that he turned to look at me. Then he gave an almighty whoop, jumped down from the handrail and came thundering at me! I had a “rabbit in the headlights” moment and just stood there, wondering what was going to happen.
Luckily must have just been interested in seeing off a rival male or something because he just charged straight past.
That evening we decided to have a farewell feast of pizza and beer, since Cassie and I would be parting ways. She was destined for the Kingdom of Brunei and I was headed to Vietnam.
Earlier in the day we had coincidentally bumped into a Belgian chap we’d met diving in Sipadan. He was also staying in our hotel so we invited him along to our shindig.
It was a good evening, marred slightly by this guy saying a lot of blatantly racist comments in an attempt to be funny. Turned out we’d forgotten how annoying he was so I decided to try and get so drunk I didn’t notice.
We eventually stumbled to bed.
Shortly after nodding off I was rudely awoken by a loud banging on our door. I groggily put something on and went to answer. I was confronted with our Belgian friend, now appearing to be both amused and irate. Apparently we’d wandered off from the bar and not bothered to pay our tab, leaving him to pay all of it! I apologised and gave him some money, feeling silly.
He left, muttering “Typical sneaky englishman”
Once there we were lead up some walkways to a tree lined clearing. That’s where we found them - relaxing in the trees; on logs and so on; even on the walkway as we passed.
We wandered around for a while, taking pics and saying “wow” a lot.
After a while we came across the alpha male of the group (we could tell he was the alpha as he had the biggest nose of all). He was sat on a handrail of our walkway a short distance ahead.
I got my phone out for a quick snap. As I did that he turned to look at me. Then he gave an almighty whoop, jumped down from the handrail and came thundering at me! I had a “rabbit in the headlights” moment and just stood there, wondering what was going to happen.
 |
| Just about got a pic of the alpha before he charged |
Luckily must have just been interested in seeing off a rival male or something because he just charged straight past.
That evening we decided to have a farewell feast of pizza and beer, since Cassie and I would be parting ways. She was destined for the Kingdom of Brunei and I was headed to Vietnam.
Earlier in the day we had coincidentally bumped into a Belgian chap we’d met diving in Sipadan. He was also staying in our hotel so we invited him along to our shindig.
It was a good evening, marred slightly by this guy saying a lot of blatantly racist comments in an attempt to be funny. Turned out we’d forgotten how annoying he was so I decided to try and get so drunk I didn’t notice.
We eventually stumbled to bed.
Shortly after nodding off I was rudely awoken by a loud banging on our door. I groggily put something on and went to answer. I was confronted with our Belgian friend, now appearing to be both amused and irate. Apparently we’d wandered off from the bar and not bothered to pay our tab, leaving him to pay all of it! I apologised and gave him some money, feeling silly.
He left, muttering “Typical sneaky englishman”
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